How to do you feel about Monuments?
 

It's a couple years down the road, did it grow on you? If you listen now, are there any emotions attached to it?

Fierce sex arousals

haven't bought it yet

general disappointment and shame

Makes me wanna fart

Has it already been a few years since? Wow. Fuck you, time

Has about a track and a half's worth of good material on there from what I remember. Haven't really had the urge to go back to listen, you see.

What's not to like about monuments?

This is my favourite monument. Apparently it's the tallest non-religious statue in the world. I like how she has outstretched arms and is holding a massive sword, it really is a marvel that it is all held together like that.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...A%D0%9D%29.JPG

pretty meh. not necessarily bad, but not a lot of replay value. I do like the one and all riff and dorian despite its repetitiveness.

I actually did like the song writing on oceania. would have liked to have heard that material with jimmy. on a related note talking about Monuments being a few years removed now, how the hell was oceania 5 years ago? Wild to me to think how long "SP2" has been around. I mean there was 4.5-ish years between Gish and MCIS and it's just crazy to think the amount/quality of material put out in that period compared to past 5 years. I realize bands don't traditionally put out as much material in their later years and the fact that an album every 2 years in the 90s was fueled by record company contracts (perhaps one good thing of record companies from yesteryear keeping bands writing/putting out music and not too much time to think it over), but still it sucks for my aging ass to wrap my mind around it.

i manage to get pretty nostalgic about it, even if i thought the album was mediocre then and still do now. would by lying if i said i don't get tiberius, drum + fife, and dorian stuck in my head every once in a while. it's also one of the easiest pumpkins albums to listen to since it ultimately lacks substance (i try to ignore the lyrics) and it's very short, and it's made shorter if i skip the two songs off it i abhor. i don't think i've touched it in almost a year, though

december 2014 does feel super long ago

God now I want to punch you as well as your avatar in your respective faces.

Where/what is this?

it was better than Oceania
not neccesarily better than Zeitgeist on account of the performance aspect w Jimmy on that one and Corgan wasn't pulling a St. Anger w the guitar solos
but yeah the songs on average were better, even if it did have 3 of what were probably his bottom 10 or 20

I'm surprised to hear someone say that. I supposed if you didn't like that Oceania was trying to be a classic pumpkin record, and he didn't sell you on it, then I could see liking monuments better. I will admit though, I only bought the two of them together about 6 months ago, and I didn't want to burn them out so I have limited their play on purpose, even though I like them both. And Oceania has gotten more play.

:dammit:

lol it is not better than oceania

it's a nothing album.

I essentially lost all faith in Billy and the Smashing Pumpkins name after hearing Monuments. I was one of the relatively few people who actually liked Zeitgeist and originally liked Oceania, but the lack of quality found in Monuments pretty much forced me to re-access how I felt about Billy's abilities.

Hearing Billy during the promotional campaign for the album say how he'd grown as a songwriter and how he felt Monuments was a batch of "really strong songs" and hearing him talk about how he was deemed a musical genius in the Chicago school system as a child made me want to vomit as Monuments has three of the worst songs Billy's ever written in "One and All (We Are)", "Run2Me" and "Antihero".

It became very clear to me during this time that at best Billy's been stagnant as a songwriter throughout his career as he follows the same tropes he's been using for decades (writing the same kind of songs, nonsensical lyrics, titles that have little, if any relevance to the song, etc.) and it's just abundantly clear that he's overconfident in his abilities and has an incredibly warped vision of himself and the quality his work. I guess in his mind that having an album without guitar solos changes the formula but in fact it just made the album sound like a half-assed affair.

I honestly feel that he should have called the album Troll cuz that's certainly what it feels like: Him trolling on his fans. Which is what he's been doing since he revived the Pumpkin name in 2005.

Essentially Monuments is to me what Zeitgeist is to many other SP fans in that it really turned me off from the Corgan brand. Don't get me wrong, I want to have good SP music... it's just that the vast majority of Monuments ain't good music, and keep in mind, there's only nine songs on the album.

Monuments is pretty awful with no replay value for me. Does "Tiberius" make anyone think it could've been a Zeitgeist track? Just kinda has that vibe/energy about it. Wonder what the batch of songs he had in mind for "Day For Night" would've been like... probably no better, just as well he abandoned that idea.

It's a pretty weak follow up from Oceania, I actually really liked that one...

Wait don't tell me its in Ordos City! Or is it one of those phoney momunents you get to erect in Sid Meiers Civilization IV?

How the fuck am I supposed to google search an image? Huh? Tell me that!

Russia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Motherland_Calls

Re Dorian: Somehow the wallpapering of empty repetition in the lyrics allows me to let bill loose of this one. Or the lyrics are inoffensive such that I can shut down my reaction to hearing bill's rough old voice, or trying to give shits re what bill could possibly be saying/feeling (or how he's trying to entertain me)

And I just hear cumcastles. Of glittering synth heavens and slowly swooning lil stabs of fuzz guitar that dissolve n ooze downward. Sly slithering arpeggios trading high fives before going up stairs or down stairs

when i first heard dorian i was struck by how it sounded nothing like any other song from billy i'd ever heard

yep, nothing album sounds about right.

Best thing about MONUMENTS:
it's running time of under 33 minutes :nuke:

It had FOUR singles. Must have been a THRILLER-album:bananamac. You don't release four singles just for promotion...

Singles from Monuments to an Elegy:

"Being Beige"
Released: October 20, 2014

"One and All (We Are)"
Released: November 5, 2014

"Drum + Fife"
Released: November 20, 2014

"Run2me"
Released: October 23, 2015

...with Jimmy:

what exactly is a single nowadays? something to play on the radio?

https://youtu.be/uuSLpa5bQvE?t=3m38s

Isn't this THE IRISH, the ex-soldier, who worked on tour with the PUMPKINS, playing in THE DRUM AND FIVE the guy with posttraumatic stress disorder?
"‘Drum + Fife’ was originally a folk song. We really had a problem getting it off its almost dour Irish balladeer aspect."

I thought One and All was a cool song that begged for a solo to make it just a decent, no frills alt-rocker, but Corg (in typical fashion) eschewed whatever he thought anyone expected of him, regardless of whether or not it made any sense. Sometimes that works. This time, it did not.

Other than that the album is largely forgettable. Maybe listened to it once all the way through, and nothing about it ever made me feel like I needed to give it another full listen.

His vocals are so so bad. Totally killed whatever positive vibes the song was inflicting